DR. AMBEDKAR AND THE HINDU CODE BILL 1053
clause. Dr. Ambedkar has become so impatient that he wants to bring forth a child, no matter if it is blind, devoid of limbs or unable to move. What he wants is a son so that he may have somebody to offer Pindas to him.
An hon. Member : So that he may get deliverance ?
Shri Bhatt: Pardon me. May he live for a thousand years ; I am speaking only figuratively. If Dr. Ambedkar and Pandit Jawaharlal feel so strongly about passing the Bill, we will bring round those who have been termed as lunatics. Use whatever methods you like to bring them round, to repress them, we are with you and may be we would also come under your influence but please refrain from passing a legislation that is incomplete, invalid and base. On the contrary it should be lofty. Why do you say that you do this and you do that just to accommodate us ? Don’t do it if you think it is not right. If we are elected to the next House we will say with more courage that we are armed with the mandate of the people on this question and we are not going to bow to the directives of anybody else. We will bow only to the will of the people. I am a quiet man and do not wish to prolong my remarks on this point. A couple of days back I had occasion to go to a factory. People working there asked me what all this fuss about the Hindu Code Bill was. I countered that question With the remark as to why they were afraid of this measure. They said “This is going to put an end to our religion, there would be chaos in our society and we will deteriorate.” So I had a talk with them. Many of them were intelligent people, who had read the draft Bill. We should not think that those who are opposing this Bill are doing so without understanding it. They referred to the provision about divorce and said that these days they can get divorce more easily according to the prevalent customs. “Why should you”, they said, “ drag us into the court and make us say that a woman is immoral and make the women accuse their men of adultery ? It is better to discuss these thing in our Panchayats and people who understand the truth about a particular couple will separate them.” Now, this needs a lot of consideration. Will Dr. Ambedkar argue that divorce rules, wherever they operate are very lenient and should not be so because that will endanger Hindu religion ? Hindu religion is not endangered because of that. There are others who say that Hindu religion will be endangered if this Bill is passed. We have to tax our brains to see which side is right. Everybody has to think. Then I asked those people in the factory as to what else they had in their minds. Then they mentioned the problem